Happy Birthday Dalai Lama

Today, July 6 is Dalai Lama 75th birtday.

Since morning, today large crowds numbering about 5000 began to assemble at the Tsuglagkhang temple in Dharamsala, Himarchal Pradesh, India to join the birthday celebrations of Dalai Lama.
Special prayer sessions were held for the well-being and long life of the Dalai Lama.

His Holiness attended the prayers and blessed his followers from 9am to 11am. The celebration was also attended by The 17th Karmapa, Ugyen Trinley Dorjee.

Staring out at a banner depicting him at various stages over the last three-quarters of a century, he reflected on his work of preaching peace and religious tolerance while keeping the issue of Tibet in the spotlight.

"When I see those pictures and see the development, I know my life has not been wasted," he said.

Tibetan communities in North America, Europe and Australia organised festivities on Tuesday, but in the Nepalese capital Kathmandu police briefly detained around 200 Tibetan refugees on their way to a birthday celebration.

Tibetan in Nepal celebrate His Holiness Birthday in Kathmandu.


On July 3, more than 1000 held an early birthday celebration for Dalai Lama in London



Born July 6, 1935, to a farming family in a small hamlet in Taktser in Amdo province in northeastern Tibet, the two-year-old child, earlier named Lhamo Dhondup, was recognized as the reincarnation of the 13th Dalai Lama, Thubten Gyatso, in 1937.

He fled Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, basing his Tibetan government-in-exile here. The Dalai Lama has favoured "greater autonomy" for Tibetans rather than complete independence.

Though he has expressed his willingness to go back to Tibet and resolve the complicated Tibetan issue by agreeing to an autonomous Tibetan set-up under Chinese control, Beijing has shown no inclination to oblige him. Chinese leaders have, in fact, called him a 'splittist' - one who wants Tibet to secede from China.

In 1989, he won the Nobel Peace Prize for his non-violent struggle for Tibet. He got the US Congressional Gold Medal in October 2007, even in the face of protests by China.

The Dalai Lama, despite his age, continues to travel throughout the world, meeting presidents, prime ministers and rulers of various countries and giving his teachings on Buddhism. In an average year, he is away from home for about half the time and in the past 12 months has visited France, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, the United States (twice), Taiwan and most recently Japan.

The history of Dalai Lama